Latkes (Potato Pancakes)

I feel like a horrible secular Jew and a horrible non-secular vegan. It’s the middle of Hannukah and I haven’t posted a latkes recipes yet. Well, better late than never. These are in Veganomicon and are the most irresistible fried potato concoction there is. Serve with apple sauce, if you’ve got VwaV the roasted applesauce in there is great with these. But any apple sauce will do, really.

If using a food processor:
Use the grating blade to shredd the potatoes and the onion.

If shredding by hand, use a grater to shred all the potatoes. Dice the onion as finely as possible.

Have ready brown paper shopping bags or paper towels for draining the oil from the latkes. You may also want to have the oven on at 200 F to keep the latkes warm until you’re ready to serve. If serving immediately then just have a baking pan covered with tin foil ready to keep the finished ones warm after they’ve been drained.

In a large mixing bowl, using a wooden spoon or your hands (I use my hands, it’s faster) mix the potatoes and onions with the potato starch until the potatoes have released some moisture and the sornstarch is dissolved, about 2 minutes.

Add the salt and pepper to combine. Add the matzoh meal and mix well. Set aside for about 10 minutes. The mixture should get liquid-y but sticky.

In the meantime, preheat a large preferable cast iron but definitely non-stick skillet over medium heat, a little bit on the high side. Add about 1/4 inch layer of vegetable oil to the pan. The oil is hot enough when you throw a bit of batter in and bubbles rapidly form around it. If it immediately smokes then the heat is too high and you should lower it a bit. If the bubbles are really lazy then give it a few more minutes or turn the heat up a bit.

With wet hands (so that the mixture doesn’t stick) roll into small golf ball sized balls. Flatten into thin round patties. I do about 4 to six at a time. Fry on one side for about 4 minutes, until golden brown. Flip over and fry for another 3 minutes.

Transfer to the paper towels and proceed with the remaining latkes. Once latkes have drained on both sides, place in a baking pan to keep warm.

I made these from Vcon the other night, and they were excellent – just the right texture, etc. And they reheated quite well the following day. Next time, I will increase the amount of onion, but that’s just my personal taste.

Made these from Veganomicon for my Jewish boyfriend the other night (if I didn’t observe Hannukah nothing would have happened in our house.) Pronounced “really awesome” and better than his mom’s and – better than the from-a-packet ones!!! Latkes have now moved well up his list of ways he likes to eat fried potatoes.

Thank you so much for (in VCON) legitimizing my family’s pronunciation of the word as “lat-key”. I can’t tell you how many looks I get from people when I say it this way after moving to California. I guess “lat-key” must a Midwestern Jew thing.

I made the Autumn Latkes for a hannukah party a few days ago, and they were so good! And beautiful! I ate so many latkes that night that I felt like one big potato (root vegetable!), so I hesitate to make any more latkes this go around. But I want to make these!!!

I made these for my Hanukkah party!!! Actually I made mine with cilantro in it. Herbs make latkes sooo much better. Everything I made was vegan actually (and it was almost everything there) I also made the roasted applesauce, the autumn latkes, the sour cilantro cream, chile cornmeal crusted tofu, green pumpkin seed mole sauce, veg chili, and i think that’s it, but i really can’t remember. O wait the jicama salad. Sorry I don’t have pix!! No one else there was even vegetarian, but they all ate everything. Our family friends son who’s 13 said to me before he left, “That chili was really good, even if it didn’t have meat in it”

If you want your latkes to be really crispy, then you have to squeeze some water out of the potatoes. To do that, wrap the shredded potatoes in a plain cotton (not terrycloth!) tea towel, and squeeze and twist as hard as you can, as long as you can.

These are great! I forgot to buy the onion at the store so threw in some minced garlic and they were excellent! Also, couldn’t find maztoh so used crackers ground up and it was nice! Yum Yum thank you!!

Mmmmmmm! We made these with the horseradish-dill sour cream from Veganomicon tonight! These are fantastic latkes, they stay together so well, cook nicely, and taste delicious! I’m impressed! Thanks Isa!

Since our family freaks out because we are vegan we made these and the roasted applesauce and brought them to dinner. They were so delish! Even the family raved about them. Take that non-vegan family members! Thanks Isa.

I’ve made these fried several times, fantastic, and lately I’ve been baking them. I just spread olive oil over them on a cookie sheet, then bake until they are crispy! This is my favorite latke recipe! It is too good to save only for Chanukah, I make them throughout the whole year!

Made vegan latkes for the girls tonight. Call me crazy, but I think they actually turn out better this way! All the same, the little one loved them. My picky girl was not impressed. What am I going to do with her??? I refuse to serve cheese and white foods for breakfast, lunch and dinner…sigh.

In looking at the recipe, I noticed that you did not squeeze out the liquid form the shredded potatoes, which I have always had to do, making traditional latkas. Please clarify. It would be nice not to have to do that.

I made these tonight for Hanukkah. They were fabulous. Perfectly crispy, no squeezing. I even got to use all the old stale matzoh from Passover. As another poster mentioned, I might add more onion next time because I really love onions, but these were great as is.

I’m going to be making these for my son’s kindergarten class tomorrow and want to prepare ahead as much as possible while also having them ‘help.’ (Ya know, since splattering oil is so fun for 5 year olds). Is there anything I can make any of this ahead of time? Can I grate all the potatoes/onions or will they turn a funky color? Thank you for any help or suggestions!

Made the Autumn Latkes in Veganomicon today to help work through 10 CSA beets (!!), subbing in a bit of coconut flour for sweetness to try to entice my kids. I think I added too much fennel for their liking, which means more for me! Thanks for such a great recipe–they’re beautiful, all jewel-looking!

To those who asked about baking, no, because if they are baked they are not latkes. They may be edible or even good, but they are not latkes. The point of Hanukkah foods (i.e., latkes and sufiganyot) is that they are fried in oil to commemorate the miracle of the oil to relight the Temple menorah. Baking latkes is in the same category as the idiot who fried his latkes in bacon grease. Just no–that’s a potato pancake, not a latke.

These were perfect! They tasted exactly like the non-vegan latkes my parents always made. I used matzo ball mix instead of plain matzo meal, and omitted the salt and pepper (since they were already in the matzo ball mix) and they were delicious and tasted exactly as latkes should. Yum

One of the parents at my daughter’s nursery school is bringing latkes tomorrow, but she’s allergic to egg (and I’m vegan), so I just made these. Going to have to fight urges to eat them all tonight. They are outstanding. Thanks for another great recipe, Isa!

These are AMAZING! I made them for an early Hanukkah party last night and everyone said they were my best ever. I can’t believe that you don’t have to wring out any of the moisture! I was pretty concerned about that, but Isa’s recipes are always awesome so I followed the instructions despite my skepticism. I hand grated the potatoes but used a food processor for the onions because I hate that part. Really recommend using a cast iron pan for that extra crisp.

Well these were totally on point. I doubled it, which was about right for 10 people. I wanted to suggest upping the salt a bit, but I was using some unfamiliar sea salt product (not my kitchen) so maybe it was just a less dense salt than I guessed.

I had never actually made latkes before, and I haven’t had them since going vegan around 4 years ago. So there was a bit of a learning curve for frying technique, how thin they should be and how much they needed to be fried, which just took a bit of testing.

A couple family members who have made latkes in past years were concerned that the recipe didn’t mention pressing water out of the shredded potatoes, and were fairly sure I should take the time to do that (and judging by other comments here a lot of people had this concern), but I pushed for following the recipe just as written on the basis that the eggless approach (with starch) is a little different and ICM knows what she’s doing.

And it worked! So in addition to being vegan, this recipe has the benefit of being easier.